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The best advice really is to download trials first. Both corel and adobe offer one month trials - I suggest you download them and see which one you prefer.

I personally use Paint Shop Pro as when I used the trial versions, I found it much easier to use. It also does text on a path which as far as I am aware PSE doesn't do. Although it isn't something that I necessarily use on every LO, it was important to me to be able to do it. Other than that, I think PSE is very similar in its capabilities.

Photoshop CS has far more capabilities than PSE and PSP, with the price tag to match!! Whether you would need all the bells and whistles that it has, I don't know - II have always managed to do what I want to do with my LOs in PSP, including designing, although with designing, somethings probably took me longer to do than if I used PSCS.

Sorry, maybe a bit biased, but as it is all I have ever used, I do prefer PSP, but others prefer PSE/CS

I am a brand newbie, too, and I bought the Wacom Pen/Touch Bamboo Craft tablet for 119.00 at Best Buy. It came with BOTH PSE 7 (I know, 8 is out, but in reading the reviews, it didn't seem like I would even miss not having 8) and Corel Painter Essentials 4 (which, to be honest, I haven't even looked at). I think this will give me a chance to learn about both, then when I have at least some idea of what I am doing, I can buy the bigger/better/newer version of either one later. New editions seem to come out every year, anyway.
I have been using the PSE 7, and while it has a very steep learning curve, I like it a lot!
Good luck, HTH,
Lori

I agree with Twirlyjoy - get the trial versions of each of the programs and try them out. Mind you Photoshop will be a little more daunting until you actually do the tutorials and take some classes but the classes are sooooo worth it!.. And there is the cost consideration too. It all boils down to what you want, like and are willing to spend.

I have PhotoShop CS3 and after taking the classes here LOVE IT. It's so much more powerful than I expected so I'm glad I went with it. I don't know what the capabilities of the other programs are though as this program was a gift so I didn't get to try the others out first .

I use Photoshop Elements so not familiar with PaintShop. Love it.
So powerful.
Layers, filters, effects, frames.
Not sure what it can't do. (Maybe brushes and styles?)
Can do even pretty good photo editing, although I think there other sw which does just photo editing software

Only problem I've had is how to do a text box and have the journalling align with normal spacing. No matter how small (12-14 font size), when enter to go to the next line, it places it like an inch away. Importing text also gives same results.
To get around, need to place each line manually.

Mine came with a flatbed scanner purchased maybe 5 years ago.

So might want to go that route -- a Pen tablet certainly is useful.
See also if a new camera or other hardware might come with either....

Only problem I've had is how to do a text box and have the journalling align with normal spacing. No matter how small (12-14 font size), when enter to go to the next line, it places it like an inch away. Importing text also gives same results.
To get around, need to place each line manually.

In Photoshop CS3e you click on the text tool. Highlight the text and then use Alt arrow key to change text spacing.